Kids bounced around on a blue trampoline under a sprawling
fruitless mulberry tree in the front yard of Gary Vargas’ home just
before 9 p.m. Saturday night.

Moments after going in for the night, the sound of at least four
shots echoed off the homes lining the 7700 block of Casa Blanca
Street in Riverside, leaving two people wounded in front of the
Head Start child care center across the street from Vargas’
home.

A napping Vargas woke up to his daughter’s telling him she heard
shooting. He looked across the street to see one person lying on
the ground and people from the neighborhood gathering around him,
yelling and screaming.

A dark car from a house down the street bolted up to the wounded
male and people scooped him into the back seat and sped away,
presumably to the hospital, Vargas said.

“For that to happen right across the street like that, that is
pretty crazy,” Vargas said. “With kids playing on a trampoline just
before that.”

Riverside police said in a news release Sunday they had no
suspects in the shooting, which critically injured at least one
person.

Vargas and others around the neighborhood said they heard the
person had been shot in the head.

A woman who answered the door of one house said at least one
victim was a relative visiting the home. She said the family had
little information about the condition of the victim, who was
walking with two others when the shooting started. The woman
refused to give her name.

Police reported another victim suffered a minor wound and was
released from the hospital Saturday night. Another person escaped
injury, the release stated.

Police also had no motive for the shooting as of Sunday
evening.

Authorities stayed on Casa Blanca and Depot streets until after
2 a.m., seeking whatever information they could get. Vargas said
they talked with him twice, along with others in what he described
as a neighborhood of mostly longtime residents. Everyone knows
everyone and in many cases are related, he said.

“It hasn’t been really bad here,” said Vargas, who said he’s
lived in the Casa Blanca neighborhood for 23 years. “But here
lately, there’s been some crazy stuff happening here.”

Investigators have no suspect information at this time and the
investigation is on-going. Anyone with information is urged to call
Detective Jim Simons at 951-353-7138 or Detective Dave Smith at
951-353-7103.